Selective radiation heating has been done for a half century plus. There has been much research done on which frequencies heat the body the most...resulting in the RF radiation regulations affecting many parts of Title 47 C.F.R

Kanzius's technique requires the introduction of gold or carbon nanoparticles into the tissues to be treated. Maybe that was covered otherwise in the last half century, but I doubt it. It seems to me that tissue with a suspension of conducting particles in it is potentially a rather different radio frequency material than human tissue without.

Our results demonstrate that gold nanoparticlescoupled with a noninvasive radiofrequency generatorare a potentially novel method for ablatingtumors. Our in vitro cell culture tests demonstratethat colloidal gold nanoparticles are not directlycytotoxic but can, upon exposure to the RF field,be heated to a degree that results in cell death

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I don't hate amateur radio. Had I hated it, I wouldn't have taken the test and been granted my amateur radio license.

The real problem you have is that I am a realist and not gratuitously praising YOUR hobby as a group of innovators/inventors of radio technology.

The real problem I have doesn't really have anything to do with what came before or after this post. You're not my favorite contributor to eHam. But honestly, I've seen you make plenty of rational points without getting nasty and I much prefer that to some of the other bullcrap that goes on around here. I don't have to like your message or agree with you generally to concede that some hams (and the ARRL) may have an inflated and distorted view of the importance of radio hams in the development of modern technology.

But the seeming insinuation that K3TUP's contribution must be worthless because he failed to save his own life with it is pretty low, and from what I understand with my understanding as a non-medical-professional it couldn't have saved him even if it is a promising treatment.

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I had an aunt (wife of my late uncle) who died as a result of leukemia so I've got some emotional basis to my comments.

I'm sorry for your loss. As someone with two close family members who are living with cancer (under control so far), I have some emotional basis to mine too. One of them is in a state of overall health that would make chemotherapy or major surgery extremely dangerous, and has already exhausted the allowable doses of ionizing radiation. So far, screening and minor surgical removal of cancerous tissue have proven sufficient. But at the moment, that is essentially the only option.

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Again, not being an alleged expert on carcinoma, I can't really respond.

I don't appreciate your phrasing. It seems phrased to dismiss my comments (apologies if I am incorrect). I never claimed to be an expert, and expertise is not required in every discussion. Non-experts can extract ideas from what they've read in reliable sources and even synthesize new ideas from those without being inherently wrong. I'm not some credulous swallower of every bit of quackery that comes along. And if I'm interested in a particular scientific topic I seek out the source papers in peer-reviewed publications (not perfect, but the best we get), because the "journalism filtered" version is, at best, irritating if not so distorted as to be inaccurate.

I will happily consider alternative points of view and defer to anyone who presents a legitimate factual challenge to what I've said. Had Kanzius's technique acted on ordinary, unmodified human tissue, your points about the past half century of radio frequency diathermy research would have been good reason for me to cede the point. That has been tried. In my medical-non-expert opinion, the biggest challenge to this technique is effectively getting the nanoparticles into the cells, but as far as my medical-non-expert knowledge goes, that is already a partially solved problem as well. The medical experts will be the ones that ultimately decide whether or not this is useful, but I remain optimistic that this is actually going to make a difference in the lives of certain cancer patients. Furthermore, I think it might have applicability to the situation that one of my family members would be in if the cancer came on aggressively. And last, I think it's a real shame that Kanzius himself could not benefit from his own technique.

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Okay, and I thought N2ZD's (was KB2CPW a year ago) was way out of line

Maybe so. But if you'd left the first line off your reply, phrased it differently, or something, I wouldn't have said anything.

Please don't assume so much. I got my amateur radio license grant for MY reasons, reasons which are NOTrhetorical.

The FCC has generously given all amateur radio licensees the OPTION of doing what the licensee wants to do (within the law). If they want to operate all the time, fine...if they don't want to do anything for 33 years, that's fine, too. It is the licensee's choice, not some minority group of old men sitting in a minority group of radio amateurs in a suburb of Hartford, CT.

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... You're not my favorite contributor to eHam.

I'm not here looking for love or admiration. I suspect that many others are. Even more hams seem to fantasize overmuch on their own technical ability and also fantasize on being professional moreso than the real professionals. That is one of the points I made on so many trying to make Radio Shack into some kind of ham shack store which it never was.

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I'm sorry for your loss. As someone with two close family members who are living with cancer (under control so far), I have some emotional basis to mine too. One of them is in a state of overall health that would make chemotherapy or major surgery extremely dangerous, and has already exhausted the allowable doses of ionizing radiation. So far, screening and minor surgical removal of cancerous tissue have proven sufficient. But at the moment, that is essentially the only option.

My first wife died from cancer long ago and I had to watch it happen every night after work and each weekend. Yes, I know what kind and how it spread, but why recite that? It is painful to recall what I went through as a young man. What such things sharpen in individuals is that life is finite and none of us are immortal.

Denial is a defense mechanism to permit survival, an emotion. I'm sorry that Kanzius' experiment on himself did not save his life, but he tried. Trying to subvert that by linking it to ham radio wonderfulness is, in my opinion, nonsense.Anyone with electronics knowledge can get RF sources sufficient to duplicate that experiment, no license needed, if their own life is in jeopardy. But, it is still an experiment and not a cure-all just because someone with particular hobby thought of it.==========================

The original posting in this topic was on the Radio Shack chain store for consumer electronics. Perhaps, in their beginning, they wanted to be like Allied or Newark or Avent or Mouser or other distributors? I don't know and don't really care. They were certainly not another HRO or AES or other specific radio hobby distributor even though Radio Shack has carried a few ham equipment items.

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I don't appreciate your phrasing. It seems phrased to dismiss my comments (apologies if I am incorrect). I never claimed to be an expert, and expertise is not required in every discussion.

On electronics technology, and 'radio' is part of electronics, if the discussion is supposed to be objective, then I daresay that expertise is definitely preferred over un-informed amateur opinion about technology. Now that will get some others all fired up and want to vent outrage against me. I've had it done to me for years as a (mere) professional working in it for (horrors!) actual money at least six out of seven days a working week. I've been told I was a newbie in radio even 57 years after keying-on a 1 KW HF transmitter (one among 36) for the first time. I've been told I was uninformed and ignorant because I couldn't do OOK CW radiotelegraphy and didn't have that allegedly-superior amateur license (even if I'd held a Commercial license since 1956).

Some of those comments are just the usual brag tape running by others, wanting to be superior to others (sometimes any which way they can) or just plain jealous of some advantages I've had. Those latter types are welcome to walk in my shoes and feel the grief also...and see if they like it.

The Radio Shack chain is widespread in the USA. They are a good outlet for consumer-grade electronics at reasonable prices. In my experience, they are a good place to get all sorts of small batteries (watch, calculator, etc.). My wife saw a nice bedside radio at a Radio Shack in a local mall walking tour and bought it, has enjoyed it. I've gotten several things at different Radio Shacks. There are four within 15 minutes drive from my house. By comparison, there is only one HRO outlet at 20 minutes drive with only street parking (the old place was in a mini-mall with good parking). As luck would have it, there's a Fry's consumer electronics supermarket just ten minutes from my house near BUR (Bob Hope Airport). Fry's has all sorts of electronics for sale, even some components and Tektronix scopes, does good business on weekends. Fry's grows slowly but it does grow on products move across the many checkout stands.

Emphasizing Fry's is not exacly ham radio oriented...but neither is Radio Shack. Times have changed and there isn't a big business in ham radio things now. It was different in 1940. Just about the only consumer electronics product lines were MF-HF reeivers oriented to broadcasting. Now we have TV that just changed from analog to digital, FM stereo, cellular telephones that can record images, cordless telephones operating at 5 GHz, Bluetooth wireless headset adapters for cell phones, a hundred million cell phones in the USA and more internationally, personal computers for three decades now at clock speeds of 2+ GHz with 1 TB hard disk storage for under $150, all sorts of connections possible through the Internet that has been public for 19 years, a whole national society involved with the Internet, wireless networks for residences, wireless networks for TV (such as AT&T U-Verse), and 300 thousand Technician class amateurs operating above 30 MHz.

I haven't filled in the remaining consumer appliances available today that weren't there back in 1940. But, some want a simpler life of back then...when medical research wasn't as advanced and a diagnosis of cancer was pretty much a death sentence for all...and simple tooth X-Rays used higher exposure with tiny film. Today those tooth X-Rays use semiconductor detectors and the images can fill a computer monitor and be stored on mass memory devices. My dentist has an electronically-controlled crown maker (adapted from a prototype device used in mechanical engineering) so that a crown for a tooth requires only 1 appointment for everything.

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Maybe so. But if you'd left the first line off your reply, phrased it differently, or something, I wouldn't have said anything.

Okay, you are still pissed off. Understood. Now, how do you feel about Radio Shack stores?

Okay, you are still pissed off. Understood. Now, how do you feel about Radio Shack stores?

73, Len K6LHA

About the same as the pending patent on the "flux capacitor" and the ad hoc self appointed "father of modern HF mobile" aka "the man behind the curtain" K0BG.

Even though he's been told "his clothes are missing" he still doesn't believe it.

Some emperor huh?

Too many Chiefs and hardly any Indians...:-)

BTW, I didn't and don't care to turn anyone off from these Forum Topics since I like to see what all the others' opinions are. Sometimes not exactly fun to read certain garbage but that's the way to hold a REAL discussion. Turning off certain others is arrogant proclamation to my mind...and it can also indicate they can't stomach such discussion.

Okay, you are still pissed off. Understood. Now, how do you feel about Radio Shack stores?

73, Len K6LHA

About the same as the pending patent on the "flux capacitor" and the ad hoc self appointed "father of modern HF mobile" aka "the man behind the curtain" K0BG.

Even though he's been told "his clothes are missing" he still doesn't believe it.

Some emperor huh?

Too many Chiefs and hardly any Indians...:-)

BTW, I didn't and don't care to turn anyone off from these Forum Topics since I like to see what all the others' opinions are. Sometimes not exactly fun to read certain garbage but that's the way to hold a REAL discussion. Turning off certain others is arrogant proclamation to my mind...and it can also indicate they can't stomach such discussion.

73, Len K6LHA

As far as technical discussions here, there's only a handful that generate some really good articles, and have a great, and long professional background (with "real" education in their discipline") and experience to back it up. W8JI, KL7AJ, W5DXP just to name a few. And then you have some that are pure hobbyists that think they're "technical radio gods" (I won't name them, it should be obvious who they are) that come in with garbage and misinformation, and argue with the guys that know what the hell they're talking about. You'd think some of these hobbyists think they're "Tesla", or "Marconi" by the way they go on.

I could care less what some senile old ba*tar* that uses "perfumey" (sic) "flowery" babble to cover up his "make it up as you go" B.S. theorems over optimal HF mobile ground vehicle antenna systems, and who also made such an ass of himself on his own website (and other places) that he received threats of litigation to the extent he had to do some serious editing (still proudly lists his url in every post). And, he still has a blind following of fans that worship him like he's some sort of god!!!!! Incredible!!!!

And also I'd sure as hell rather read some good stuff from guys that have some decades of experience in the RF engineering disciplines, with formal engineering credentials, and are also hams, than read some silly ass philosophical nonsense from some smart ass kid that thinks he's the new prodigy of physics because he's pursuing some sort of degree somewhere most people could care less about.

Yeah...I know, it's only a hobby. I'm reminded of that every time I read the aforementioned garbage. Yup, this ham radio internet nonsense here is just that. It doesn't deserve any serious credence or attention as far as technical benefit. Just entertainment in very moderate doses. A waste of time.

Yeah...I know, it's only a hobby. I'm reminded of that every time I read the aforementioned garbage. Yup, this ham radio internet nonsense here is just that. It doesn't deserve any serious credence or attention as far as technical benefit. Just entertainment in very moderate doses. A waste of time.

Well, it serves several purposes. One, it gives a semblance of being around other people without leaving a communications device. Two, it is a way for some to get a reputation that they can't get otherwise face-to-face. Three, it can be a form of contest all by itself, showing a station (and all the goodies they have) or bragging (sometimes umercifully) about how good they are.

Meanwhile, the Radio Shack stores have a useful purpose in that they provide several kinds of consumer electronics for ordinary people...non-ham people which outnumber active-licensehams by about 460:1 (give or take).

Meanwhile, the Radio Shack stores have a useful purpose in that they provide several kinds of consumer electronics for ordinary people...non-ham people which outnumber active-licensehams by about 460:1 (give or take).

73, Len K6LHA

Yup, *real* *ordinary people* with *real* money to spend on what sells in Radio Shack vs. some goofy cheap bastard that bitches because he can't find a $ 0.20 resistor there.

Meanwhile, the Radio Shack stores have a useful purpose in that they provide several kinds of consumer electronics for ordinary people...non-ham people which outnumber active-licensehams by about 460:1 (give or take).

73, Len K6LHA

Yup, *real* *ordinary people* with *real* money to spend on what sells in Radio Shack vs. some goofy cheap bastard that bitches because he can't find a $ 0.20 resistor there.

An old tagline favorite of mine is: "Mankind invented language to satisfy its need to complain...

Meanwhile, the Radio Shack stores have a useful purpose in that they provide several kinds of consumer electronics for ordinary people...non-ham people which outnumber active-licensehams by about 460:1 (give or take).

73, Len K6LHA

Yup, *real* *ordinary people* with *real* money to spend on what sells in Radio Shack vs. some goofy cheap bastard that bitches because he can't find a $ 0.20 resistor there.

An old tagline favorite of mine is: "Mankind invented language to satisfy its need to complain...

73, Len K6LHA

Actions speak better than any words for those smart enough to understand.

It is time to end this useless post. Ther is no more Radio Shack. I was in there last week and all their posters and bags say "The Shack". This post has become a flamming atack that will do nothing good for amateur radio!!Just my .02 cents worth.

At one time, Radio Shack was a major retailer of both amateur radio equipment and relaated parts and accessories, operating with just a few stores and a nationally-distributed catalog. The early catalogs are interesting to read.

At one time, Radio Shack was a major retailer of both amateur radio equipment and relaated parts and accessories, operating with just a few stores and a nationally-distributed catalog. The early catalogs are interesting to read.

And the ads, too.

I pulled a 1947 QST off the shelf and found a three-page ad from Radio Shack. One page was new ham gear, the other two pages were military surplus!

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The changes happened for lots of reasons:

1) It used to be that electronics of all kinds was expensive and unreliable. Repair/replacement parts were a big business, and so was homebrewing. Not so much any more.

2) Some technologies change so fast (computers) that a store must specialize in them compete. The local Microcenter is where most folks around here go for serious computer stuff. Specialization means you need a big store, and relatively few of them. Radio Shack is built on the opposite model.

3) The internet and higher gas prices have brought mail-order full circle. Digi-Key, Mouser, Hosfelt, Dan's Small Parts and many other suppliers carry an enormous selection, and since the parts are small and light the shipping isn't expensive. Those of us who actually build stuff don't depend on single sources of parts.

4) You can still get a lot of stuff at Radio Shack - *if* you know where to look and how to ask. For example:

I've used heavy-duty RS masts and hardware in my wire HF antenna supports since the early 1980s. Had to order some of it in advance, but if it was in the catalog they could get it.

Couple of years ago I decided to build a Morse Code keying interface between the shack computer and rig on short notice; RS had the parts I needed.

Couple of months ago had a printer problem that had to be fixed right away. Needed crazy glue and heat-sink compound. RS had both.

At one time, Radio Shack was a major retailer of both amateur radio equipment and relaated parts and accessories, operating with just a few stores and a nationally-distributed catalog. The early catalogs are interesting to read.

And the ads, too.

I pulled a 1947 QST off the shelf and found a three-page ad from Radio Shack. One page was new ham gear, the other two pages were military surplus!

Ahem...1947 was 63 years ago. I was alive and a teen-ager then. You were neither. <shrug>

It is my opinion that Tandy Corporation's choice of "Radio Shack" as a store name was taken so literally by many hams as being a "radio store for hams" as in the old name of "Ham Shack." It never was such a store. It was basically a chain of consumer electronics outlets. Consumer electronics outpaced amateur radio products by a wide margin in sales a long time ago.

No doubt some will take terrible offense to that remark of mine and "call me out" on that.

Cheers,Len K6LHA

It may never have exclusively catered to hams but at one time Radio Shack did sell some very nice ham gear including Collins gear and a lot of items for building projects. That day came and went many years ago leaving us with just some good memories - nothing in this life is permanent.

When did hams last invent technology? When did hams ever invent technology?

I just could not let these comments go by without a response.I wish that I could write about the numerous projects in which I have been involved as a Sales-Engineer in this century from coast-to-coast where I dealt personally with electronic-engineers, some of whom are active hams, who push the limits of technology. Due to national-security reasons, these hams are prevented from publicly talking about their work.Separate from that, there is a topic in the public-domain that can be discussed.Isn't the latest rage in ham-radio the digital-mode?Notable examples are PSK31 and Olivia.It was Pawel Jalocha, a Polish physicist, SP9VRC, who provided the seed for G3PLX to come up with PSK31. Jalocha created Olivia. Contestia and RTTYM came from Olivia.73 Jerry KM3K FN10je

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